


Flashes

by A Magiluna Stormwriter (ariestess)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-30
Updated: 2013-04-30
Packaged: 2017-12-10 01:00:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/779967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariestess/pseuds/A%20Magiluna%20Stormwriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say that in the final moments of your existence, your life flashes before your eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flashes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Gryph](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gryph/gifts).



> More in-depth notes to come.

They say that in the final moments of your existence, your life flashes before your eyes. It's supposed to be some kind of divine greatest hits reel to give you a hint as to what kind of afterlife you'll get. Of course, this is usually thought to be important to people who give a damn about such things.

For the longest time, I never cared about that sort of thing. It was sentimental frippery that's just a waste of time. There is no afterlife, and anyone who believes there is such a thing deserves the most painful and hideous of deaths, just to extend their ecstatic suffering until they become so much rotting meat. 

I wonder if he gives a damn about it. Does he regret anything in his long and infamous life?

Watching Rumplestiltskin as he lies dying is one of those situations where I should be joyous. I am the only person alive in over three hundred years to best the imp at his own game. It's not even a matter of living to tell about it. I did it. I know it, he knows it, my _daughter_ knows it. It's only a matter of time before the rest of the world knows it. Perhaps that grandson of mine can add it to that infernal book of fairy tales he covets so much.

But I'm not. There is a part of me that actually fears the loss of the Dark One. Perhaps that's the reason I keep hesitating, rather than sinking the krys blade into the space where his black and shriveled heart barely beats. To hear the stories from my daughter and various of the idiots in this town about how he supposedly found True Love with that naïve Belle is enough to make me laugh at his sentimentality, but I can't quite get to that point. He said he loved me, wanted me to run away with him, once upon a time. Clearly that was just as much a lie as anything else that's ever slipped past that forked tongue of his. If he loved me as much as he professed back then, he'd never have found love with that child, Belle.

Perhaps it's best that I removed my heart when I did. To have allowed myself to feel love for this wretch of a man would have ruined me for life. Especially if his claims of True Love with Belle are true. I'd have been nothing more than a convenient notch in his bedpost to allow him to get my firstborn child.

Oh, Regina… My beautiful daughter. No matter what I had to do to make her a queen, she has been my top priority. I don't understand why she can't see that. She clearly does the same thing for that son of hers, even if he treats her with less respect that she ever did me. When she finally realizes that love truly is a weakness, she'll understand that everything I've done has been for her. Even staying away from her while I was the Queen of Hearts in Wonderland.

Wonderland. That was a unique slice of both heaven and hell, wasn't it? Becoming the Queen of Hearts was relatively easy. Those pathetic idiots had no idea how to deal with my magic or my drive for success and the throne. The Red and White Queens were easy enough to dispatch. They actually made quite lovely statues in my private garden. I miss being able to stand before them, discussing all of the things I'd done and seen, knowing they were in stasis beneath that veneer of stone, alive and able to hear me, but unable to do anything else. I daresay it's a far more suiting punishment for one's enemies than the sleeping curse that crazy dragon-witch used on poor Aurora. The stone curse has only one cure: the one who cast it can reverse it with a few drops of blood and intent. Red and White will be stuck in their personal hells for the rest of eternity. Unless someone destroyed them in the wake of me leaving Wonderland.

Ah, Wonderland. I'm sure there's nothing left of my beautiful castle and grounds now. Such a shame, really. It was exactly what I've always wanted. And knowing that so many people would willingly, grudgingly scrape the floor with their knees before me was a heady experience. Even if they only did it to keep their heads intact on their bodies, they still did it at the slightest glance from me. It was better than when King Xavier and all of his court, including my dimwitted whore of a husband, bowed before me and my daughter. It was better than that because they never stopped doing it until I left. I wonder how many of them still automatically drop to their knees at the mention of my name? What I wouldn't give to find out.

But this land that Regina brought everyone to is better in so many respects. It is also quite limiting in even more. Magic is very restrictive here. I've had to work far too hard to accomplish things that the barest of thoughts took care of in the Enchanted Forest and Wonderland. Well, in all of the Fairy Tale Realms. I think that's the phrase I read in one of the entries in Regina's personal journal. Really, the girl should know better than to think she can keep something like that from me. She clearly has forgotten that lesson from her childhood. I blame the cricket for getting her to use those journals for dealing with her emotions again.

She obviously needs to lose her heart, like I did, in order to reach the great heights she was destined for. She was born into royalty, even if her father foolishly squandered away his options, choosing instead to live like a common lord, rather than the prince he was. We had a lovely manor, but it should have been more. Everything should have been more. Regina inherited too much of Henry's sentimentality for her own good. It makes me shudder to think what kind of children would have been ruling in Henry's stead, had he married Eva instead of me. Would they have all been like that little waste of royalty, Snow White?

Perhaps Regina _was_ right in wishing she'd let the girl die. She could have borne a child to Leopold that would cement her place as Queen of his lands. My grandchildren would be princes and princesses, furthering the magic and power of my lineage. I could have come back then, taught Regina more about magic than that imp did. I could have taught my grandchildren the same, rather than have young Henry fear and loathe me, just like Regina. The only difference is that Regina also loves me. More the fool she. Love is the ultimate weakness that will destroy a person.

Not even dea--

The sensation is nearly indescribable: searing heat licking along my nerves, setting my skin ablaze with sensation, battles with liquid ice in my veins that burns in its own ways as it races from the far reaches of my extremities toward the organ throbbing in my chest. Every fiber in my being is trembling under the staggering weight of an awareness I haven't felt in longer than I care to admit.

Looking up, I can see her standing there, eyes flickering with fear, uncertainty, and an overwhelming hope and love. It's the same look she always wore as a child, when she earnestly fought for my approval, for the smallest scrap of affection that I could never give her. It wasn't until I killed Daniel that she truly understood that, no matter how hard she tried, she would never be good enough for my love and affection. Not that she understood why.

Until now.

In the space between one heavy heartbeat and the next, one exhale and the inevitable inhale, it comes in a rush of tsunamic proportions. It's not my life that flashes before my eyes. It's hers: the first sense of her quickening in my womb; her wriggling kicks to diaphragm or bladder, already trying to get my attention; the long hours of her delivery, including my refusal to use magic for fear of inciting Rumplestiltskin's wrath; holding her tiny body in my arms as she settled almost instantly and stared up at me with wide, guileless eyes; her first words, first steps; her utter devotion to her father at war with her constant craving for my affection and devotion. The images keep coming, one atop the next in a flood that barely allows me the chance to grasp at one before the next replaces it. Nearly twenty years of her life, retold in mere minutes across the tattered canvas screen of my soul, causing me to laugh at the sheer joy of what she _had_ accomplished in her life, both before and after banishing me to Wonderland.

And then the pain comes: hot, searing, debilitating pain radiating out from just right of my returned heart. It's enough to drive a lesser woman to her knees, but I refuse to show weakness in front of Rumplestiltskin, now that I realize what has happened. I will not let him stand over me as I grovel on the floor before him. I will grovel for no one again, not since I was forced to so many years ago by my father-in-law.

Glancing down, I can see the dark stain spreading with each labored beat of my heart. The pain is overwhelming now. For all that my pride is strong, the ache in my chest is overwhelming, and I lurch forward toward Regina as my knees give out. The sensation of her arms around me, cradling me close, is eerie and comforting at the same time.

"Mother?" Her voice seems miles away, as she tearfully stares at me. "Mother? What's wrong?"

I can feel it. I'm tired, unable to fight what has been inevitable since the day I removed my heart and found a way to best Rumplestiltskin. Glancing up into those soulful brown eyes, I smile at my daughter one last time before my eyes drift shut.

"This… Would’ve been enough. You… You would’ve been enough."

"Mother? What’s going on? Mother? Don’t leave me, please… What am I going to do?"

The last thought to pass through my mind before darkness engulfs me is simple and straightforward.

_You're going to live and avenge my death. Make me proud, my dear daughter._


End file.
